Impact of Commercialized Urban Spaces on the

Public
In recent years, the outdoor advertisement has been deeply rooted in the
representation of cities in China. Ranging from traditional large display like billboards
and LED screens at public plazas or squares, to the incorporation in everyday objects
like the back of front row seats in taxi, poles at the bus shelters, windows or walls
inside the subway trains and stations etc., the medium used to convey consumerist
values is getting increasingly creative, as advertising companies are competing to
stand out not only in content but also in the form to promote their products. To
some extent, outdoor advertising symbolizes the flourish and progress of the
Chinese economy, transforming urban spaces into sources of potential profits for the
business. Yet, it is also an ideological manifestation, implying a society making use of
collective resources to communicate dominant social preferences. Regardless of
residents having democratic accessibility or not, the genuine aspect of a so-called
“public realm” has long been monetized, replaced by the public-private partnerships
in exchange for the maintenance and sustainability of city infrastructure. Moreover,
this also raises controversies over the role of government agencies or authorities to
play in regulating the outdoor media landscape, as their partial interest may be quite
similar to — if not the same as — the advertisers’.

As one of the fastest growing industries in China, outdoor advertising has thrived on
average more than 26% per annum in the last two decades (Iveson 153). With
technology fueling the advancement of billboard construction and deployment, the
public space has been recognized for its socioeconomic potential to propagate
consumerist values and political ideologies. As a result, advertisers and campaign
agencies pay increasing attention to not only “spatiality” in terms of physical
dimensions, but also to the “temporality” – movement and demographics mapping
(Koeck et al. 1405). These two factors are deeply integrated into their marketing
strategies to enhance the performance of message conveyance, turning the urban
realm into a series of visual spectacles. Shanghai subway, for example, is no longer
just a place of transit or commute, but also a potent discourse in favor of commercial
forces. Thanks to the hyper-interactivity and population density (i.e. the “spatiality”
aspect), subway advertising is able to reach a variety of potential consumers as they
go about their everyday lives. More importantly, subway commuters – who are
mostly young, middle class, and urban residents – are specifically targeted, as they
account for a large population who is economically and politically active (Lewis 265).
That being said, aside from the spatial advantages, the efficiency of this particular
outdoor advertising is also attributed to the demographics who engage in the
practice of commute; and in turn, those urban dwellers are expected to reciprocate
with consumption (Wei and Pan 92) – or in some cases, political devotion.
Similarly, outdoor advertisements in both Shanghai and Hong Kong aim to entrench
the consumerist and ideological values into the urban space. On the one hand, with
leading-edge screening technologies, Shanghai is well-known for its public screen
advertising culture. The first form is the moving text-based screen – either as the
“walking words” screens with ticker tape style text moving horizontally across them
or as a loop of slides similar to a powerpoint presentation (Berry 124). It is
prominently used in entranceways or other liminal spaces, catching one’s attention
with the predominant red color. Moreover, the type and size of the screens along
with content displayed often varies according to particular usages and locations. For
example, when placed in retail spaces like shops and banks, walking words screens
attract pedestrians by detailing the latest offer and promotions; whereas in the
entryway of a housing compound, the messages could be informing new
governmental policies or simply slogans against drugs and prostitution,
disseminating political values and propaganda. The second form is the moving image
screen.  Ranging from the huge LED screen covering sides of office towers to
interactive bus shelters, such adverting technology has become commonplace (Berry
110). In particular, TV programming (regulated by a company called Mega Info
Media) is widely applied, exhibiting a mix of brief entertainment features like
commercials. The electronic-based semantic content embodies consumerism yet
disguised as creative production, encouraging every urban individual to act upon the
values promoted. At the same time, it introduces new visual stimuli in a hyper-visible
way, constantly reiterating the commercial nature of a supposedly public space
(Cronin 2747).

On the other hand, as for Hong Kong, improvements in digital print and high
definition monitors have also drastically increased the quality, variety, and flexibility
of outdoor advertising (Lopez-Pumarejo 1). Going through childhood memories, my
first impression of Hong Kong (i.e. in early 2000) was the intensity and prevalence of
outdoor advertisements (i.e. traditional print-based). Innumerous signs, texts, and
images were densely placed adjacent to one another, dazzling pedestrians with such
unique scenery. Most iconic of all were those colorful commercial wrappings. They
could be around double-decker buses and taxis, around construction site
scaffoldings, and even on revamped historic buildings. Despite that the images glued
onto traditional billboards were rather low quality or even just printed on the vinyl
sheet, the placement and utilization of everyday objects were in fact cost-effective. In
a densely populated city like this, colors on everyday objects can be particularly
vibrant and eye-catching,  constituting a fun yet modern city atmosphere. Nowadays,
although traditional print-based media are gradually replaced by digital billboards or
other high-end interactive technologies, the overwhelming consumerism essence of
the urban realm remains consistent. Moreover, ads produced by multi-national
corporations seem to invoke more subtle means to identify with diverse communities
and groups (Lewis 263), given the multicultural nature of the city itself.
To some extent, outdoor commercials present more than just an alternative medium
facilitating the commercialism. The technology of advertising production and survey
research form a rapid interactivity between consumer and producer, creating unique
forms of consumption-oriented collective identity for segmented populations.
Consequentially, they may even stand ahead of other media popular culture such as
film, television, and literature etc., shaping the collective cultural discourse of future
generations in China (Lewis 267). In metropolitan cities like Shanghai and Hong
Kong, outdoor advertising tends to appeal to local, national, and transnational
communities (Lewis 263). However, it is more common to see traditional political
symbols being used in commercials in mainland China, serving as a means to
resonate more with the nationwide audience. For example, Yu Zhao Lin (俞兆林)
pharmaceuticals advertisement in Shanghai uses the figure of an emperor standing
in front of the Imperial Palace in Beijing, giving a “thumbs up” as an approval for the
products (Lewis 263). Royal mascots like golden dragons are applied to connote
traditional notions of luxury, suggesting the supreme quality and thus luring in
potential consumers. Meanwhile, commercials in Hong Kong seek to ask viewers to
identify with the accelerated consumption habits, which are consistent with the
stereotypical fast-paced urban lifestyle. In the Hong Kong subway, a commercial
played on public TV screens showcases a fashionable man pulling luggage through
an airport hall, who checks his time on his Rolex watch while awaiting the departure.
The set up hints access to wealth and international mobility, which engages in urban
professional class that floats among global cities (Lewis 264). Moreover,
internationally known figures also are employed to personify a transnational lifestyle
(Lewis 263) in addition to enhancing the brand’s credibility. In a way, those outdoor
advertisings are representations of the city or even the nation. They are incorporated
in the context of globalization, carrying messages promoting conspicuous
consumption with subtle and complex rhetoric of transnationalism and localism
(Lewis 267). Most importantly, they are capable of reflecting the interests of local
governments and corporation in addition to shaping the consumerist culture,
bringing in economic prosperity while compromising the democratic access
belonged to urban citizens.

While outdoor advertisements promise the merit of the consumer culture, it also
inevitably results in potential hazards to the civic environment such as creating visual
pollution and chaos. Spatial order can be severely disrupted, as those outdoor
commercials are aggressively invasive by occupying every corner of the city. Such
“in-your-face” marketing technique may not even be effective as expected, as our
encounters with such advertising clutter are thus becoming much more prosaic. From
media-owning companies’ standpoint, spaces are expected to be mappable,
quantifiable, and populated by saleable segments of consumers (Cronin 270). Yet,
there are constant movements and changes in the city, given the transitive nature of
the urban flow. That being said, glances at fragments of texts, blurs of color, and
impressions of shapes during those brief transit moments will not necessarily be
translated into the advertised information as it was conceived (Cronin 270). As a
result, the dialogues that advertisers attempt to achieve with the public are thus
resisted or ignored, as the public space is rather perceived as three-dimension than
simply a “call-and-response” interaction.